


Secrets And Shifters

by flickawhip



Category: Maestro (TV) RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2016-03-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 12:59:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6154537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flickawhip/pseuds/flickawhip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU as hell. </p><p>370) Cougar's Conquest - Linda O. Johnston<br/>Katie Derham hasn't seen John Vincent in over a year, not since their relationship had ended so abruptly.<br/>Not since the brilliant, sexy man she fell for learned her secret and she'd been forced to flee. Now John is back with an offer to join a covert military unit of shapeshifters, and the spark of their attraction is instantly reignited.<br/>Neither can resist sharing one last night of passion, but as a cougar shifter, Katie had been taught only to trust her own kind. Can she truly trust John with her secret...and with her heart?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fleeing From Him

Katie Derham had dared to love a man, a man she had once dreamed she could love and marry.... and then he had learnt her secret. Her deepest secret and a source of shame... She had fled, not once stopping to look back at him. Ignoring his call. Ignoring everyone. She had been so hurt she had not thought to stop until she was in the woods near the house she had been planning to buy with him, once there the pain had overthrown all instincts and she had shifted, fleeing into the night, aware only of the primal call to flee and escape all persecution. 

That had been nearly two years ago, at the least, and she had given up on finding any love since. She was too ashamed of her secret and, even when her teachings had told her that she should only trust another shifter, even if not a cougar shifter, she had hated it. She loved men, human men. The one-natured. She was a disgrace to the two-natured community by her abilities and her insistance on loving and living with human men. Even now when she is alone, she is still unsure how wise it is to be part of the natural two-natured community. She had never fit in. 

And then he had walked back into her life. With a job offer. One she cannot afford to refuse. 

There is a military unit being formed, existing as a place for the two-natured, the shape-shifter community, to work in the military. 

She must accept and so she does, reluctantly. 

Her first meeting with the group does not go well... and she is chased from the room in tears. Hot, painful tears.


	2. Running Back For So Much More

She is followed, of course. John Vincent, the man she had loved, the man who had given her this chance. He was not two-natured, but he was the one in charge. She had turned, snarling openly in his face, screaming at him and yet he had not flinched. 

She had fled again, finding herself shaking even as he pulls her aside and tells her to meet him at his home. Despite all her determination to refuse him, she cannot refuse him. 

She arrives, dressed carefully, and he stares openly at her before letting her inside, choosing to believe he can convince her to stay. 

She fights him every step of the way, refusing to return to the unit. Refusing to let herself be put in harm's way just for one night. 

Then, something changes, she moves closer, her defenses falling away just long enough that she can speak. 

"I loved you..."

She is fleeing again.


	3. Behind These Hazel Eyes

John catches her this time, pulls her back inside and, as she stands, staring at him, kissing her fiercely. It is all it takes. She is flooded with memories and passion and gives herself over to it completely. She doesn't know who starts the undressing, or how she comes to be in his lap, his body straining to meet hers as passion flows over them still faster. It is a meeting of minds, bodies and souls, and yet she feels herself begin to sob even as the rhythmic meeting of their bodies picks up, her body clenching tightly around him, her nails digging into his shoulders even as she moves, marking him as hers. He gives her everything, holds her as she shatters completely in his arms, around him, clenching him still further, his body responding the second she is still, releasing his own hot lust in one primal yell of pleasure. It is only when they are still, Katie slumped into his arms, her forehead resting lightly on his shoulder, panting weakly, that she allows herself to speak, her voice shaking even as she speaks. 

"This... can't happen."

"Why not? Kate... Why not?"

She looks at him then, tears rolling down her cheeks, wiped away by his thumbs gently brushing over her cheekbones. 

"My people... would never accept it... any children we had would be..."

"Two-natured? I'm not afraid of that..."

His voice is soft as he speaks, his own voice shaking. 

"My mother... shifted. My eldest sister shifts..."

"But you are..."

"Human. Yes... The gene skipped any men in our family..."

"But you are the second eldest, everything in our lineage..."

"I know."

John sighs softly. 

"But my point... my point Katie, darling Katie... is that I would not ever be ashamed to call a shifter my wife, or my child..."

His eyes, the same soft hazel as ever, are bright and she finds herself smiling before she gives in. 

"You... are impossible."

"But you love me."

"Yes."

Her soft admittance is rewarded with a tender kiss, his smile soft. 

"Marry me?"

"Yes."


End file.
